Entries by siena

Don’t Take My America Away – Immigration and Soft Power

Created by Vilkasss, Pixabay The Trump administration has undertaken a wholesale effort to gut America’s soft power, from huge budget cuts to bullying most countries around the world. One of the most insidious actions has been the brutal crack-down on immigration, including attempting to end birth-right citizenship. While these actions have major impacts domestically, a […]

RIP CIA Factbook

CIA FACTBOOK 2025-2026 ————————————————————————DJT FACTBOOK 2026-??? On February 5, 2026, the Central Intelligence Agency website announced that The World Facebook would no longer be published. (The phrase used was actually “…The World Factbook, has sunset” which could have encouraged the inference that stopping publication was a natural phenomenon, not actually something done by one of […]

A Two Minute Primer – The Organization of the Department of Homeland Security

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the focus of news stories, Congressional funding and shut-down negotiations. Just what are the many components and responsibilities of DHS? Steven A. Cash served as a prosecutor in the Manhattan District Attorney’s office before joining the CIA in 1994 as Assistant General counsel and subsequently serving as an […]

What Can I Do?

The question “what can I do?” in response to Trump’s efforts to establish his autocratic rule is frequently asked these days…except by the people we deem to have the power by virtue of their jobs to enact laws and guardrails to protect our democracy; those holding elected, financial, or professional positions and the leverage to […]

The Threat to American Civil Liberties

Frustrated Americans take to the street in opposition to the actions of the Federal government. The President casts everyday Americans as pawns of foreign interests. He deploys National Guard units and other Federal forces to quell the protests, which only further inflames the situation. Inevitably, American citizens are shot dead by those same forces. While […]

The Most Perilous Time

What happens when an astronaut who’s seen Earth from 250 miles up—and an Air Force fighter pilot who’s defended it from the ground—decides that American democracy is now in more danger than at any point in his lifetime? In this conversation, Terry Virts makes a blunt, urgent case for why he’s running for Congress, why […]

Trumping the Rules-Based International Order

An altered image that U.S. President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social features the American flag superimposed over a map that includes Canada and Greenland (Donald J. Trump via Truth Social) Masked federal agents on the streets of American cities: Snatching innocents. Trampling constitutional guarantees of due process. Defying judicial orders to cease and desist. […]

The Epstein files—a choice between accountability and a spectacle

The phrase “release the Epstein files” has such rhetorical power because it promises moral clarity. It offers the public a cathartic moment, exposure, accountability, a sense that the powerful can’t hide behind the system. And in a political culture that increasingly treats outrage as both a pastime and a strategy, it can feel especially satisfying: […]